Wolfforth water now in full compliance with EPA standards

With its new water treatment plant up and running, the city of Wolfforth said Monday it is in compliance with the Safe Drinking Water Act regulations.

Darrell Newsom, city manager, says the city has been taken off the out-of-compliance list and will no longer need to send out notices to Wolfforth citizens related to water quality.

The improved water comes after the construction of a $6.7 million water treatment facility. The city’s electrodialysis reversal plant, or EDR plant, became operational around this time last year. The plant, according to a letter sent to the city last week, proved to be effective in reducing inorganic contaminants from the city’s water.

Newsom said citizens have taken notice, too.

“We saw improvement in a lot of things,” said Newsom. “People have come to me and said they’ve turned off their water softeners, they’ve turned off their treatment systems and things. Usually we don’t hear about things unless people are complaining about them, but we’ve actually had people tell us how much better the quality is.

“You can see the difference on your dishes. It’s softer and it’s cleaner.”

Construction of the $6.7 million project, according to A-J archives, was voted on by the city of Wolfforth following a letter from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in July 2011 informing officials they must improve the city water’s or face fines.

The city was dinged by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as having high levels of arsenic and fluoride. The city became non-compliant as a result of new Texas Commission on Environmental Quality standards, as the acceptable level of arsenic went from 50 parts per billion to 10 parts per billion. A-J Media reported at the time that other cities such as Dallas, New Home and Morton received similar administrative orders to clean up its water.

Newsom said all of Wolfforth’s water comes from wells inside the city limits. During the summer, he said, the city uses over 1.2 million gallons a day.

The letter from the the EPA says the administrative order is closed thanks to the city of Wolfforth taking successful steps to correct the fluoride amount.

Newsom admittedly said it feels good to be out from under the EPA’s order.

“A lot of small towns just didn’t have the opportunity or ability to fix this problem,” Newsom said. “Just the engineering costs alone, and just trying to wrap your hands around this whole thing — some towns just said it’s too much to handle. We’ve had a lot of people come to us to see how we’ve done it.”e said the city had to raise water rates to pay for the water treatment plant, but said some citizens are saving money because they’re no longer paying for water softeners.